


November 2018, California - Part I

by germanjj



Series: Buried Under Clear Glass (Finished Series) [6]
Category: Call Me By Your Name (2017) RPF, Call Me By Your Name - All Media Types
Genre: First Kiss, First Time, M/M, Red Carpet, Slow Build, Slow Burn, THAT top
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-10
Updated: 2020-04-10
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:49:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23581135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/germanjj/pseuds/germanjj
Summary: Sometimes love is so clear to see, visible for everyone around you, and yet you're not able to reach out and touch it, grab it, pull it towards you. It's like it's buried under clear glass.And sometimes, when you're reaching out and finally do touch it, you have to make a choice.
Relationships: Timothée Chalamet/Armie Hammer
Series: Buried Under Clear Glass (Finished Series) [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1657570
Comments: 11
Kudos: 86





	November 2018, California - Part I

The cameras and the shouting of the reporters always feel like thunder on a summer evening, a low, constant rumble, lightning hitting in rapid succession but not close enough to inflict any pain. They say it's right overhead when thunder and lightning are not far behind. Walking a red carpet and posing for the press is always a little bit like walking through a thunderstorm. 

I don't mind it so much most of the time. I don't mind it when I don't have to do it by myself, and my wife and I have already been joking that I would have to re-learn how to walk a red carpet without Timmy around. 

I glance down to him while he's speaking to a reporter, and I'm glad it's not today. Today I'm here with him, for him, and we pose together, my hand at the small of his back, close enough his nervous energy seeps into my skin, spurs on my own. 

It's at the second or third time we're posing when it happens. My hand is just hovering behind him when he moves his arm and rolls his shoulders as if to loosen a kink in his neck. It's an innocent, subconscious gesture, done a thousand times, but he stumbles back a bit, and my hand goes to grab him, to steady him instinctively, when his suit jacket rides up just enough that my hand doesn't land on it but underneath it. 

And touches warm, soft, _bare_ skin. 

A jolt goes through his body, like a ripple dancing over every inch of smooth skin, and I can feel it, that same jolt shooting from his skin onto my fingertips and from there through my whole body, too.

I glance over and meet his gaze. There's alarm in his eyes and something else, and a tinge to his cheeks that wasn't there before. He seems almost guilty.

As subtle as I can manage, I remove my hand, my fingertips grazing his skin, my palm touching something that seems to be a knot in the fabric just above his pants. I let my arm fall loosely to my side.

My heart is thudding in my chest, my fingertips itching to go back. The growling thunderstorm in front of me is almost muted, as if behind glass, and my head makes up images of Tim without his jacket on, of my hand on his naked back, of my fingers slowly undoing all the knots. And then redoing them, pulling them tight. 

"Armie." He says my name under his breath and it pulls me out of the fog, a blush now spreading on my cheeks. 

His face is guarded as he's looking up to me, and I can't help but think about how we've kissed at our first and only _rehearsal_. How I had lost myself in that kiss, how ashamed I had been immediately after. For being so unprofessional that for a second, I had forgotten that I was not kissing him because he wanted me to. His face had been guarded back then, too. And then, after a moment of silence, we had broken into fits of laughter. 

There's no laughter now. His eyes flicker over my face as if he's checking up on me, gauging my reaction.

Is he looking for amusement? For anger? Arousal? 

As we are approached by the next reporter, my mind is stuck in the perpetual loop of imagining what he looks like without the jacket. 

Did he choose to wear this just for himself? An inside joke between him and the cameras, and it had nothing to do with me? Am I blowing this up in my mind to something more profound than it really is?

Or did he choose this, knowing full well after months of making the same poses, of my hand always at the small of his back, that I would be the only one touching him, that I might be the only one finding out that the top he is wearing is exposing the delicate skin of his back? 

I want to know. The urge to lean over and whisper into his ear becomes unbearable. _'Are you wearing it for me?'_

Would he laugh? Would he recoil in confusion? Would he blush?

I shake my head to clear it and take a deep breath. 

But I hadn't imagined his reaction when I touched him. He had taken a sharp breath, had shuddered under my hand. 

Had blushed. 

The interviews drag. I steer my concentration back to focus on the reporters and the questions, barely succeeding, and I'm aware of Timmy's every move, every brush against my arm, every look he trails over my face when he thinks I'm not looking. I find myself glancing down his back, to see if the straps of his top show underneath the jacket, find myself even reaching out in a mindless second before I catch myself. I can't see anything. 

The dance continues. A new reporter, then a few steps and posing again. My hand once again hovers behind his back, careful not to touch. We do that a second time, a third, Timmy close to my side but not close enough my hand would brush against him again. Even though it's all I can think about now that the trigger has been pulled, and the imprint of that touch clinging to the palm of my hand. 

I reign myself in near the end, convincing myself I am making too much of it, being embarrassing and out of mind. I already imagine us laughing about it later, about how Timmy wore some outrageous top that had no back and how I had found out by accidentally slipping under his jacket. It would all be a big laugh. 

But then we pose a last time, my hand in its place, grazing Timmy's suit jacket but not quite touching, when he does that thing again, that shoulder roll, and he steps back, into my hand. 

It doesn't slip under this time. My hand is warm against his jacket, warm against where underneath I can feel the knot where the straps hold it in place. In a fit of insanity, I move my hand underneath the fabric. 

He shudders when my hand touches his naked skin. Out of the corner of my eye, I see him close his eyes briefly, witness the rise of his chest as he takes a sharp breath, just like before. 

Blood is rushing in my ears, hard enough to drown out the noise around us. There's a voice in the back of my mind trying to get my attention, to make me think about this, about what I'm doing, about all the implications of Timmy pressing against my hand even now, like a cat, leaning into the touch as subtly as he can manage. But my focus is solely on where my thumb caresses his spine, where my nails scrape lightly across his skin. 

Timmy gasps next to me, masking it with a laugh but not before I hear him. He shoots me another glance, and his eyes are entirely different now.


End file.
